Review: Batman and Robin #25

Ex-Robin Jason Todd continues his escapades in mayhem, but it's feeling like old hat.

If Batman And Robin #25 has shown us anything it’s the fact that Batman and Robin has just about run its course. The shtick is old, the pages are worn, and the whole thing is starting to smell ripe with repetition. Not so much the idea that something bad happens and our heroes leap into action, but more the whole dynamic between Dick Grayson’s Batman and Damien’s Robin. Over and over, it’s "Damien acts like a douche and Dick tells him to shut up." In one form or another, that’s pretty much how all the issues in this series have gone. At the beginning it was interesting to read, now it’s just dull and annoying. I think the real problem is Damien, a character that had potential but has now become boring.

Issue #25 has it’s own problems as well, ones not tethered to the failing Damien and Dick Grayson dynamic. First of all, it concerns Jason Todd and is written by Judd Winick. Winick can’t seem to get past his resurrecting Jason Todd from the dead and so we’re constantly forced to endure another story where Jason acts like a tool, spits out a lot of annoying rhetoric, and then manages to slip away so the most useless character in the DCU can come back again. Todd has become that annoying uncle that never knows when to leave. The story behind issue #25 is particularly insipid because it has to do with Jason Todd rescuing his sidekick Scarlet. Scarlet is another in the sudden crop of Harley Quinn wanna-bes that DC is forcing on readers. There’s also Enigma or Question or Riddle or whatever the hell the Riddler’s daughter is named.

So Jason Todd manages to get Dick and Damien to help him with the rescue, the whole time acting like a jerk to Damien. Watching the fourth Robin get put in his place would be fun if his antagonist weren’t Jason Todd, who is just as boring and mediocre. There’s a big battle and Scarlet is rescued, and just as Batman and Robin are about to nab him, Jason escapes via the biggest I-call-bullshit distraction ever. With so much great work going on in Detective Comics and Batman, Batman and Robin continues to fail epically. Perhaps the big reboot will bring some new juice to the engine, but for now, I think it’s time to retire this particular version of the dynamic duo. I also would love to have Jason Todd killed off, for good this time. Why DC continues to try and wring stories out of this dry and boring concept is beyond me.

The art from Greg Tocchini and Andy Smith is decent enough; nothing that knocked me out of my chair or even really made me take notice. The best artwork of the entire book was Guillem March’s cover. Batman and Robin #25 is a testament to just how done this series is. When the big Subway sandwich inserts are more exciting than the rest of the book, it’s time to call it a day.